Live...from the Brink

By James Poniewozik

On Sunday, April 9, comes zero hour. The brave volunteers will be sealed in the war room--no civilians allowed, only a telecom link to their commanders--to carry out a perilous mission and stare into the void. They've rehearsed the horrifying scenario over and over. But this will be no drill. If all goes wrong...the survivors will envy the dead!

O.K., so the Warner Bros. set in Los Angeles isn't a NORAD bunker. But the similarity is no accident. When executive producer George Clooney and crew re-create Sidney Lumet's 1964 nuclear chiller Fail-Safe, with CBS execs and director Stephen Frears (High Fidelity, Dangerous Liaisons) watching nervously from a trailer outside, they'll be facing another cold war-era specter: live television. Airing at 9 p.m. E.T. (delayed P.T.), this pet project of Clooney, a longtime lover of live TV whose father Nick was a newsman and variety-show host, will be CBS's first theatrical production in 39 years and perhaps the most risky recent TV effort not involving a millionaire and a bride. As in war, there's been little time to prepare: camera blocking began only last week. On top of that, Frears and a cast of film stars have had to adapt to the medium, with the help of live-TV producers. But Richard Dreyfuss, who plays the American President, says the risk attracted him: "It's like an electrical charge."

CBS's production is faithful to the gripping (if didactic) original, in which an accidental bomber launch against Moscow triggers a chain of excruciating decisions. In a way it's a natural for live TV--taut, unfolding largely in real time. But the original drew its charge from the threat of war with an empire that no longer exists (though its weaponry does). So why do it now? Because George Clooney wanted to. He made Fail Safe a priority when he pitched shows to CBS; the network in turn insisted that he act in it (he plays a bomber pilot). "I'm the 800-lb. gorilla that can make this work," he admits. He personally secured the A-list cast, Don Cheadle, Noah Wyle, Harvey Keitel and James Cromwell among them. And he contends the story is no mere period piece. "Even though certain things were dated, it resonates for me," he says. "It's biblical, the sacrifice of Abraham."

The challenges go beyond memorizing lines. To allow multiple camera angles, the production will use 16 cameras, including several onscreen, disguised as computers and operated by cameramen in soldiers' fatigues. And as part of the program's good-for-you austerity, there will be no musical score, so emotion will have to be earned without strings or drums. There are some safeguards. The war-room set features a giant electronic map, synched to the dialogue. "We have a guy with a keyboard ready, so if an actor misses a line, he can instantly update the map," Clooney says.

Of course, you could make Fail Safe without doing it live, but you would lose the "What if they goof?" factor. As with game shows, TV is borrowing from its past here to address 21st century ratings worries. "Television is marked more and more by event programming," says CBS-TV president Leslie Moonves. (CBS recently announced plans for a live version of On Golden Pond.) Says consultant Ethel Winant, who was an associate producer of the 1950s' live-TV anthology Playhouse 90: "The actors are naked in front of millions of people...[and] the audience is part of that experience."

Borrowing a little excitement is fine, and there's something sweet in Clooney's homage to TV's past. But there's an apologetic ring to the project too; it seems to kowtow to the Edenic myth that since the 1950s, TV has charted a direct course to hell. Many of the decisions--from shooting in black and white to having Walter Cronkite introduce the production--are like penance for the past. And no such apologies are necessary. Playhouse 90 was a wonderful program, but there's a difference between creating TV and broadcasting theater, between using the medium as a unique art form and using it as a mere tool.

None of which is to say Fail Safe can't rivet viewers, using one advantage of TV: as Clooney says, "Films can't go live." It's certainly more gutsy than the live ER of 1997, whose conceit--a news crew filming in the hospital--excused gaffes as "nerves" on the part of characters. If Fail Safe succeeds, Clooney hopes to do a live A Patch of Blue starring Cheadle. If it bombs (groan), the world will survive. But for live TV, there may be fallout indeed.

--Reported by Jeanne McDowell/Los Angeles

With reporting by Jeanne McDowell/Los Angeles